Building a LinkedIn profile for freelancers

Building
up an extensive network of clients and prospects is really useful for creative
freelancers, particularly in today’s very competitive jobs market.

Linkedin can be an important
tool for freelancers – so that recruiters can find matches for relevant
vacancies and to showcase your skill-set to prospective clients and agencies.
Linkedin can position a freelance as a specialist in their field through
recommendations, skills, groups and the like.

So to
help you secure your next contract, you need to make sure that your LinkedIn
profile is complete and up-to-date. Many recruiters will actively search your
Linkedin profile and help formulate decisions on your relevance.

Here are
some top tips to help your LinkedIn profile stand out from the crowd and
harness the power of the professional network, so you can showcase your freelancing
capabilities.

LinkedIn works by keyword
searches so always ensure that your headline, summary and tags are
literally littered with keywords that are relevant to your line of work.

Emphasise results – use the
profile to boast about what you have achieved on previous assignments.

Get recommendations to back
these up! Having other people confirming that you can deliver what you say
you can really strengthens your profile.

Use LinkedIn to expand your
contacts network by using mutual connections to achieve introductions to
prospective employers.

Join the network’s relevant
groups and participate in group discussions where you can showcase your
skills, achievements and knowledge.

Get your contacts to verify
your skills.

Make sure that your profile
is 100% complete with information in all of the following fields: current
position, two past positions, education, summary, specialities, profile
picture, at least three recommendations

FreelanceUK
has partnered with The CV Centre, the authors of this exclusive article, who
not only offer CV Writing but also a LinkedIn Profile Writing service, should
you wish to use their service then please click here.